Conference as a prelude to the Manon Fauconnier Festival

Every trip has a starting point. This is why this conference as a prelude to the festival will be devoted to the music of our regions: not in the Liège region, but in Brussels, in the Cathedral of Saint-Michel-et-Gudule. In the 18th century, the former Sainte-Gudule collegiate church welcomed chapel masters whose names are now known to music lovers, such as Joseph-Hector Fiocco (1703-1741) and Charles-Joseph van Helmont (1715-1790), whose works are preserved in the Sainte-Gudule collection. This conference proposes to highlight the richness of this quite remarkable collection gathered in the 18th century by the cantor Jan Bernard Vanden Boom. Particular attention will be paid to the examination of the parts intended for instruments from the violin family, revealing the instrumental practices of the time, which will be compared with the preserved instruments from Brussels.